


Through Fire and Water

by onstraysod



Category: Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell (TV), Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell - Susanna Clarke
Genre: Community: jsmn-kinkmeme, Forgiveness, M/M, Post-Canon, Reconciliation, Unspoken Declarations
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-07
Updated: 2015-08-07
Packaged: 2018-04-13 10:02:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 6,221
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4517655
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/onstraysod/pseuds/onstraysod
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Gilbert Norrell has helped Jonathan Strange reach beyond the Darkness to contact his wife in Italy. Now, with Strange's aid, Norrell needs to contact someone else: someone he cares about, someone he owes an apology.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Fill for the _Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell_ Kinkmeme

_**Go through Fire and Water to serve you**_ \- Do anything even at personal cost and inconvenience. The reference is to the ancient ordeals by fire and water. - E. Cobham Brewer (1810-1897). _Dictionary of Phrase and Fable_. 1898.

Strange had, by that day, calculated that it took about six hours to burn one of the beeswax candles completely, and so it was by this method that they kept track of the time in the Darkness. It was an inexact method to be sure, one that required the two of them to sleep in shifts so that someone would always be awake to tend the candle left burning, and both of them had failed in their duty at least once already, nodding off to the sound of the other’s soft sleeping breath and waking to a candle snuffed out by its own melted essence. But whether or not it matched the time in the World they’d left behind, it helped them nonetheless to preserve some sense of order and routine and, less pleasantly, to count how long they had been exiled from the light. It was, by this crude accounting, about three o’clock in the afternoon when Norrell looked up from his book and spoke.

“We were in Padua, Mr. Strange!” He beamed across to where the younger magician sat in an armchair by the hearth, _Eighteen Wonders to be found in the House of Albion_ 1 upon his lap. “It is quite an accomplishment! I think we have reason to feel proud of our success.”

Strange smiled. It was not his usual boisterous grin or that sideways ironical quirk of the lips that he made sometimes when amused, but it was something, a beginning. He had been abnormally quiet for the two days since they had used the basin of water - and every ounce of their combined strength - to steer the darkness to Italy and communicate with Strange’s wife. Norrell had remained near enough to Strange to support the spell as long as possible, but he had made every effort not to eavesdrop upon the couple’s conversation and, indeed, he had very little idea of what had been said. The painful nature of it, however, was all too obvious in the way Strange had subsequently behaved: speaking in a few short, mumbled words if he spoke at all; turning the pages of books that his gaze barely touched, his concentration lost to distant vistas Norrell could not see. So for Strange’s sake Norrell had pretended to be oblivious of how the encounter had depressed his spirits, taking upon himself the mantle of insensitivity to try and rouse Strange from his melancholy, dwelling upon how pleased Strange should be by the very accomplishment of the act. Finally, that afternoon, Norrell had reason to hope that it was working.

“You are right, sir. I believe we should be pleased. Now that we are more certain of what to do I think we may expect our next attempt to be even more successful.”

Norrell looked down at the pen in his hand. It needed mending. All of his pens needed mending, a task he had always disliked, finding it tedious and time-consuming when a book waited to be read and notes waited to be taken. He had not had to mend his own pens in such a very long time. He ran the tip of a finger along the nib, counting up the years, and the thought took all of his feigned bluster away from him like an errant wind. For some time he could not attempt merriment again.

Then, twisting the pen in his fingers, Norrell looked back at Strange. “I wonder, Mr. Strange -- I wonder if it might be possible for us to make that second attempt this afternoon? If you feel strong enough, of course. There is -- there is someone I should very much like to communicate with, if I may.”

He was gripping the pen so tightly, he realized, that he risked snapping it, and so he placed it down beside his stack of foolscap and simply stared at it, remembering suddenly that it had come to him in autumn, from Scarborough, in a black box lined with tissue paper, set upon his desk atop a pile of dusty volumes purchased from the estate of an elderly shipwright. _You’re in need of a new pen, sir_ , he’d said in that matter-of-fact, rough Yorkshire growl. _There was enough left over after the books to get it, and I thought it would suit_. And it had. Norrell shifted uncomfortably in his chair, anticipating the question that Strange would surely ask, dreading that in the necessity of answering it something might be wrung from him, something he was not yet ready to surrender.

But Strange had risen silently from his chair and had come to the desk, opening Pevensey to the correct page and nodding. He laid the open book beside the basin and went to fetch Doncaster from its shelf. “We will concentrate our efforts on York, I should think.”

Norrell looked up at Strange in surprise, but Strange was concentrating on the book as he brought it to the desk and did not meet Norrell’s gaze. “Yes.”

The relevant texts were soon laid out, open to the different spells they had used to achieve their journey to Padua and Strange’s appearance before Arabella. In truth, neither of them understood exactly how the spells combined to produce the desired effect: whether the Darkness were physically relocated or whether some astral copy of themselves was simply transported to the location they focused upon. Nonetheless it worked, and that - for the time being - was all that mattered. As Strange arranged the books, Norrell poured fresh water into the basin, splashing a bit more than usual upon its rim and the surrounding surface of the desk. His hand seemed to have developed an inconvenient tremor.

“As soon as we have recited the spells and come to York I will step out into the hall, as you did for me,” Strange told him. “I will do my best to sustain the spell as long as possible, so take as much time as you need.”

“Thank you, Mr. Strange.” Norrell found himself obliged to swallow down a knot of discomfort and he took a sip of water, his mouth suddenly gone dry. He tried not to look at Strange, but he was aware that the younger man was watching him.

“Mr. Norrell?”

“Yes?”

“Would you --" Now it was Strange who hesitated, wrestling with some uncertainty. “Would you ask him to look after my wife for me?”

Norrell met his gaze and slowly nodded. “I will, Mr. Strange. Most gladly.”

Strange smiled, a tight smile that seemed to take an inordinate amount of strength to fashion. “To York, then, sir?” he asked.

Norrell took a deep, steadying breath. “To York.”

***

"You should be thinking about the Raven King."

Vinculus made this pronouncement through a mouthful of mince pie and, after spraying the table liberally with crumbs, was obliged to suspend all further commentary until he had washed the food down with half his tankard of ale. Once this was done, he wiped his mouth with the back of his hand and fixed John Childermass with a shrewd, narrow-eyed stare. "You should be thinking about these new letters on me, and what they might portend, and how we're supposed to read 'em. But you're not thinking about any of that. You're thinking about _him_."

Childermass met his gaze coolly. "And who's he?"

A little sneer curled up the corners of Vinculus's mouth. "Your magician."

It had rained all day, all the long and weary journey from Starecross to York, and only now that they had reached the city and stopped for the night had the rain conceded to cease. But it was still a most dark, dreary afternoon and the mood of it seemed to have gotten into Childermass's blood and bones like a bad chill. All was bright and cheery enough inside The Black King's Arms, a scruffy, ramshackle inn that Childermass was well familiar with: he had stayed there many times before when the day had been too late or the weather too inclement to ride back to Hurtfew, and he had always found it to his satisfaction. It was tolerably clean, the food was hot, the fires were stoked even hotter. There was generally a good mix of people, too, at the tables: locals and travellers, taking their meat and ale alone or in little groups that filled the air with clouds of pipe smoke, boisterous conversation coloured with local oaths, and loud, congenial laughter. There were card games to be had, if you were so inclined, and gossip aplenty. But none of these things had the power to stir Childermass from his thoughts that afternoon. He clung to them silently though they made him feel unpleasantly hollow, like an oyster shell deprived of its oyster, and he did not take out his pipe or lay out his cards as he was usually wont to do in such a setting. It was customary, too, for him to make some attempt to talk to Vinculus over a meal, though such conversations were rarely sensible. Often he would simply smirk at whichever corner of his mouth was unoccupied with his pipe stem and name one of Vinculus's wives: “Nan Purvis,” he might say, or “Virginia Crestwell” (this being the name of Wife Number Four, the devout Methodist). And then, to his amusement, he would watch the expression that came over Vinculus's face - disgust or anger or a wicked, lascivious grin - and settle back to await the inevitable recitation of the woman's vices or virtues. But on this afternoon Childermass had not said more than three words to Vinculus since they'd entered the inn. He had simply sat and thought, taking very little food and not much more ale, staring unseeing into the middle distance, and holding his rain-dappled coat close around him.

"Gilbert Norrell, Esquire. _Ma-gi-cian_ ," Vinculus continued in his odd, sing-song tone. "Of Hurtfew Abbey, Yorkshire, more lately of Hanover-square, London. Currently residing in a Pillar of Darkness somewhere between this world and that world and some other world right over there." He waggled his fingers in the air as he downed the rest of his ale. "Though why you should wish to sit and think on the likes of him is a mystery to me, particularly when you have such genial company. Sour sack of dough under a powdered wig --"

"You know nothing," Childermass said, perhaps a trifle sharper than he usually spoke. Vinculus grinned.

"I know more than you'd like to think I do. I've watched you, John Childermass. I know that you often fall to thinking of him, particularly on days like this when the sun never shows her rosy cheeks. Puts you in mind of his situation, I shouldn’t wonder. Then you remember that you parted badly and it weighs on you. Even though you were in the right."

Childermass glanced at Vinculus, then looked away. After a moment, however, he nodded. "I was in the right."

"So then? What's to fret about?"

"Who says I'm fretting?"

"I says." Vinculus reached out suddenly and snatched up Childermass's tankard, taking a long, rolling gulp of whatever Childermass had failed to drink. "And I'm right." He belched rather loudly.

"So what if I am - fretting, did you say? I was in Mr. Norrell's service nigh on twenty-seven years. That's longer than I knew me own mother. I suppose tis natural I'd wonder about him from time to time."

"You left his service when you walked out on him," Vinculus cackled. "You're not responsible for him now!"

"Am I not? I wonder." Childermass rubbed at the thick growth of stubble on his chin. "Sometimes I think that perhaps I am now more than ever I was before. I do have the King's own book, after all. Surely there's a way writ in there to fetch Mr. Norrell and Mr. Strange out again --"

"Won't do you no good, though, if you don't figure out how to read it," Vinculus said, giving a stretch and a prodigious yawn. "And you won't figure out how to read it by spending all your time pining after your little magician."

"Or by talking to you, as it happens, for there's an occupation in which I'm not likely to hear two words of sense strung together."

Vinculus only grinned with greater delight at this insult. "At least I've got you to say more than you've done all day. Who does that make the poor conversationalist, eh? But as your mood's not improving much with more speech, why don't you take a walk? Clear your head. I'll behave meself - on my honour." Vinculus made a little crossing gesture over the area of his heart and Childermass arched an eyebrow as if to doubt the existence of both the organ and the honour.

"I could do with some fresh air, now that the rain's stopped," he conceded.

"Go on, then, take yourself off. Best thing you can do to shake the doldrums, if I say so meself. And I've an itch in my elbow that tells me you'll benefit from it more than you can guess." Vinculus gave him a sly wink. "But it's likely to still be too damp out for a decent smoke, so -- if you wouldn't mind?" He held out his hand, palm upwards.

Childermass sighed as he got to his feet and dug his pouch of tobacco out of his pocket. He dropped it ungraciously in Vinculus's hand. "I'm not lending you my pipe, so you'll have to fend for yourself, won't you?"

"Already have." Vinculus brought a battered looking pipe out of some mysterious inner pocket, along with a dozen chicken feathers and something green and shapeless that Childermass didn't care to think about. "Nicked it off that old farmer we came across yesterday." Vinculus put the stem between his lips and hummed with satisfaction. "Good one, this. Tastes like pork."

Rolling his eyes, Childermass left him.

  


1By Francis Pevensey


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Childermass sees a familiar face at York Minster.

Outside in the rain-slick street, Childermass turned almost by instinct in the direction of York Minster. It was darker now than it had been when he and Vinculus had entered town, the canopy of grey clouds hiding the setting sun, but the rain kept off and it was only his boots that risked getting wet. The Minster was not very far away. As he walked through the familiar streets, Childermass had to concede that Vinculus had been right. He was thinking about Mr. Norrell, more so of late than he had the day he'd watched the twisting Pillar of Darkness engulf Hurtfew Abbey and carry it bodily from the world. He tended to think of Norrell on dark days such as this one, just as Vinculus had said, and often at night, when the black of the Yorkshire sky seemed to eat up all the solid land and everything became an empty void awash with distant specks of light. He would think of Norrell at tea time, when there was no tea to be had or served, and he and Vinculus were seated upon a tussock of soggy grass beneath a wind-twisted tree. And he would think of Norrell again at supper time in a wayside inn, the kind of tumbledown establishment that Norrell would have refused to enter. Most frequently, Childermass thought of Norrell when he rose in the morning, before the sun had shown itself over the rim of the world and he was dressing and thinking about the day to come and all that needed doing. For twenty-seven years Norrell had been the constant factor in his life: he had ordered each day around Norrell's needs and habits. Now Childermass found himself still, mind and body, holding to that schedule, like potter's clay keeping the shape of the mold it's been baked in. His first instincts, the little itch at the back of his mind at tea time, at supper, at dawn, was to look about him for what Norrell might require, and it took some seconds - still, after so many months - to remember he had no one to serve now but himself.

There were certain places, too, that reminded him of Norrell, and no place - save, perhaps, the lands that still belonged to Norrell around the site of Hurtfew Abbey - brought his former master to mind as forcefully as York. This was the second time Childermass had returned to the city since Norrell's disappearance and the memories flooded back just as strongly this time as they had the first. The nearer he came to the Minster the more he felt it: the Miracle of York, still echoing in the stones of the Minster, in the stones of York itself, in the soil beneath them and the clouds above them, in every weed and patch of moss and earthworm and stray, skittering leaf in between. He felt the thrill of that night as clearly as if the statues in the nave and Chapter House and south transept were still speaking, and it wasn't just that magic itself had returned to England: it was familiar magic, Norrell's magic. Or perhaps he alone felt its echo, coming not from the stones and the sky but from somewhere deep inside himself. This thought brought him inexplicably low.

Childermass had just reached the Close of the Minster when he paused and decided to turn back. He didn't trust Vinculus on his own for any extended period of time: to stay sober, to keep his mouth shut, to refrain from making a spectacle of himself or begin preaching a quasi-magical sermon on the life and glorious works of John Uskglass. Not to pick someone's pocket, punch someone in the face, or pinch some lady's bum. There was all manner of trouble the man might get up to in Childermass's absence, so he swiveled on his heel and started to retrace his steps back to The Black King's Arms, not giving himself time to consider why he was really turning away, why he did not care to linger.

It was then that he noticed it.

In one corner of the Close it was raining. A steady sheet of rain was pouring down, blurring the stones behind it like a smudged pane of glass. Childermass stopped, held out his hands: the air around him was cool, soft with the memory of the day's rain as air is wont to be after a storm, but it was dry. He looked up at the sky and saw that the rain did not seem to be falling from the clouds at all; it seemed to begin in the clear air somewhere about halfway up the south-west tower. And the oddest part of it all was that it made no sound. He could see it hit the pavement, little explosions of rain as each drop struck the stones, hard enough to produce a steady percussion, but the Close was perfectly silent. And as he watched this strange meteorological event, a kind of vibration crawled slowly up and down Childermass's spine, spreading wavering tendrils out over his skin.

_Magic._

"Childermass."

For a moment he might have sworn that he had imagined the sound of his name, ringing suddenly across the Close. His senses seemed unusually heightened, his nerves stretched tight as a drum skin, and it would have been easy for him to dream that he had heard someone calling for him. But then he heard it again, a voice he knew in the very marrow of his bones - _"Childermass!"_ \- stronger now, louder. And coming very clearly from the rain.

Slowly at first, then with increasing speed as the voice called again and again, Childermass moved toward the rainy corner. And as he drew closer, his eyes adjusting to the deeper shadows in that part of the Close, he began to see an outline in the rain, a smudged blur like a figure. Nearer he came and the silhouette became more pronounced; then it took on colour and distinctive shapes: stockinged calves, an old-fashioned green tailcoat, a wiry white wig. And there, suddenly, only a few yards before him, his old master appeared.

"Mr. Norrell!"

Norrell smiled. He stood in the very midst of the rain without getting the least wet, and he looked -- well, what had Childermass expected? In some back space of his mind had he thought that the Pillar of Darkness, the sojourn in another world, would alter Norrell in some inexplicable way? That he would take on physical characteristics that mirrored the wildness of Faery or, at the very least, some fashionable fairy clothes? But no -- he looked no different than he had the last time Childermass had seen him: not ill, not wasted by stress or starvation, and certainly no more in vogue. The sameness of him brought a strange kind of warmth to pool beneath Childermass's breastbone.

"Hello Childermass," Norrell said. "Are you well?"

"Me, sir? Wh -- Yes, yes I’m very well -- sir, how is it you've come here? Where is Mr. Strange? Are you --" Childermass stopped, an arm's length from the sheet of rain, and he stretched out his hand towards Norrell. But all he felt was water: cold, real but perfectly silent, drumming against his skin. "You are not really here, then?” he asked softly. It was not really a question.

Norrell shook his head. "It is an illusion. Mr. Strange and I use rain very like a mirror. We concentrate upon where we wish to go and who we wish to speak with, and then we use the basin of water to see the person we search for and the rain to make ourselves seen and heard. It is a combination of spells we found in Doncaster and Sutton-Grove and Pevensey, which at first I thought could not be reconciled..."

"Forgive me, sir," Childermass interrupted, too eager for answers to wait out a discourse on magical theory. "Where are you, you and Mr. Strange? I saw the Darkness take you. I saw it swallow up the Abbey and disappear."

"We do not know. Outside of your world, that is certain. In Faery, and between Faery and other lands which have no names. We stay within the confines of the Abbey, and my Hanover-square residence, and Mr. Strange's estate at Ashfair, though from time to time we venture out. Always together, never alone. Oh Childermass!" Norrell cried, a species of delight crossing his face that Childermass had only ever witnessed once, when a first edition of Pale had been purchased right out from beneath the eager, grasping hands of a rival collector from Surrey. "The things I have seen, Childermass! You would scarcely believe it! In all the books of magic I have ever read there is not a tenth of it, not a hint, not a crumb of the great depth and expanse of magic! It is far more complex and wonderful than I ever suspected."

"But are you well, sir? Is Mr. Strange well? How do you eat?"

"We are both well, Childermass. As for food -- I cannot pretend to understand it, it must be some part of the enchantment, but whenever we deplete something - say our store of eggs, of which Mr. Strange is very fond - our supply regenerates immediately! It is the same for wood and coals and candles, all the necessities. We lack for nothing!" Norrell smiled brightly as he said this, but as soon as the words had left his lips the smile faded and he dropped his gaze. "That is to say, almost everything."

"I am relieved to know that you and Mr. Strange remain together," Childermass said. "It is a comfort to everyone left behind to know that you have one another to rely upon."

"Oh! Indeed. But, Childermass --" Norrell paused, wetting his lips with his tongue, his small blue eyes darting this way and that before finally focusing again on Childermass's face. "There are -- there are several things I wish to -- to say to you."

"Do you have a request to make of me, sir?" Childermass asked.

"Well, I -- well, in fact, Mr. Strange has a request. Mr. Strange asked if it might be possible for you to look after Mrs. Strange for him? We -- I mean, Mr. Strange, with my assistance, was able to contact her not two days ago. She is in Padua. I know that it would mean a great deal to Mr. Strange if you could -- well, if you could see that she is provided for when she returns to England. To make sure that she is safe."

"You may tell Mr. Strange that I give him my solemn vow to do anything I can to aid Mrs. Strange," Childermass said. "He may rely upon me."

"Thank you, Childermass. I know that he will be grateful to hear it."

Norrell hesitated then and Childermass asked: "And for yourself, sir? What may I do?"

"Do?" Norrell swallowed visibly. Childermass noticed that he was wringing his hands, as he had often done in times of great trepidation. "No, Childermass. I can claim you as my servant no longer."

Startled, Childermass gave an involuntary shudder. "Sir, about that --"

"No, no. I believe I know what you are going to say, Childermass, but -- I release you from your service to me. There is very little that you can do for me here, after all --"

"But sir, that is not true. I have the King's book, Mr. Norrell!"

Norrell stared at him through the sheet of rain, his eyes very wide. "You have what?"

"The book of the Raven King, sir. It was right under our noses, so to speak, all along. Written on the skin of the street magician, Vinculus. You remember what I discovered about his father, having eaten the book in a drinking competition? Well, his son bears the text still."

"How extraordinary!" Norrell said softly.

"It is my belief, sir, that the book contains knowledge that will allow us to reverse the spell that holds you and Mr. Strange captive. Unfortunately, the book is written in the King's Letters and, as you know, that knowledge is obscure. But not lost completely, I think. I have already set the country's magicians the task of deciphering it, and though it may take some time, sir, I believe we will succeed --"

"But of course you will!" Norrell cried. Childermass fell silent, somewhat taken aback. He had expected Norrell to be frustrated, disappointed to learn that the Raven King's Book had been discovered but was inaccessible to him; angered, even, by the thought that new magicians - the very class of people he had feared and despised for much of his life - were even now clustered around transcriptions of the letters on Vinculus's body, tracing every line and alien letter to unlock its hidden meaning. But Norrell seemed instead delighted by the news and - what was even odder - almost unimpressed.

"Of course you will succeed!" Norrell continued, beaming. "You are, without doubt, the cleverest man I have ever known. If anyone can decipher the book, it is you."

Childermass could not help the smile that lifted up the corners of his mouth, though it was a somewhat confused, befuddled expression. "Mr. Norrell, I -- surely you consider Mr. Strange the cleverest man of your acquaintance?"

"No indeed! And Mr. Strange would agree with me, Childermass. No, Mr. Strange and I -- we are magicians. You are a magician, too, of course, but you are also a man of the world, a man of business. Mr. Strange and I have only ever been magicians. We are quite at a loss with anything that is not related to magic. You know that is true."

Childermass did not answer. He was quite unused to receiving compliments from Norrell and - man of the world or not - he was not quite sure how to respond to them.

"No, Childermass," Norrell continued, his bright smile fading again, replaced by a rapid blinking of his eyes and a deep furrow of his brow. "I -- I have nothing to request of you, except -- except your forgiveness.”

Childermass opened his mouth to speak, then closed it and shook his head. "Mr. Norrell --"

"Please, Childermass." Norrell put his hand up briefly to forestall him. "There are several things that I -- that I wish I had had a chance to say before -- before this. And -- and one of them -- the first among them -- is that -- I am sorry. I am sorry that I did not give you my permission to take the box to Lady Pole. I am sorry that I listened to Lascelles instead of to you. He was an unscrupulous man, Childermass -- and I did not like him, or trust him, not really. It was just that I was so uncertain of myself in London, and he was useful for a time --" Norrell had dropped his gaze again and was staring at Childermass's boots; through the curtain of rain Childermass could see a pink flush overspreading the older man’s cheeks. "I do not know what possessed me to listen to his counsel over yours, when your counsel had always served me so well --"

"It does not matter now, Mr. Norrell," Childermass said. "It is forgotten."

"But I have not forgotten," Norrell replied quickly, looking up into Childermass's eyes. "And I regret, with all my heart, that I did not confide in you about -- about the fairy, about Lady Pole's enchantment. I should have told you immediately, I should have sought your help, but -- I was afraid."

Childermass smiled softly. "I thank you, sir. But it is no matter now. She is free of her enchantment, as is Mrs. Strange. Please -- do not continue to be troubled by what is past. And as for what I said, that day as I was leaving --"

“No, please.” Norrell shook his head. “You were right. You were always right, and I was so very frequently wrong. I see that now. Childermass." Norrell spoke his name very softly and held his gaze, perhaps longer than Childermass had ever known him to do before. "I -- I am so very grateful to you."

"For what, sir?"

"For everything. For your service to me. For your loyalty. For your companionship." He made a small gesture with his hands, as if indicating the library of Hurtfew that remained invisible to Childermass's sight, lost behind the shimmer of the magical rain. "Being here with Mr. Strange, it has reminded me -- it has made me realize how very lonely I might have been, all those years spent in study, but for your presence. I don't think I ever thanked you for it."

Childermass smirked. "You paid me for it, sir, and that was all the thanks I ever expected."

"Well, it was not enough. You should have expected thanks and I should have given them. I don't know how this spell has affected everything of mine, whether it has spirited away all my assets and possessions, but -- if anything is left, Childermass, and if you can get to it -- it is yours. I wish you to have it, all that was mine. I never made a last will and testament, you know. I suppose I thought... I suppose I thought there would be time enough for that --"

"There will be yet, sir," Childermass said, his tone hard as if he were reprimanding an errant footman. "I'm certain of it."

"Well..." Norrell gave a small smile and a helpless little lift of his hands, then fell silent once more.

"Mr. Norrell." Childermass took one step closer to the sheet of rain. He could feel a slight mist lifting off of it, brushing the tip of his nose. "Was there something more you wished to say to me?"

Norrell's eyes were large but steady, held by Childermass's gaze. "I -- yes. Yes, Childermass. But now that I’ve come to it, I -- I don’t quite know how to say it...”

“You don’t need to say it, Mr. Norrell,” Childermass said, and it seemed to him that his throat had become oddly constricted and his tongue transmuted into a slab of lead. “I understand.”

Norrell’s eyes sparkled through the rain as if reflecting some light Childermass could not see. “Childermass. You have no idea -- you cannot know how glad I am to see you again!”

“And I you, sir.”

The sheet of rain did an odd thing, then: it seemed to twist, to compress itself and coil like a rope, warping the image of Norrell for a moment before straightening itself out again. The distortion was accompanied by a low sound or, rather, a reverberation just beneath the range of human hearing. It made Childermass feel unsteady on his feet and some pigeons that had been roosting on one of the buttresses of the Minister rose up into the air in a body and flew noisily away.

“Sir?”

“It is the spell,” Norrell said, a strained note in his voice. “It cannot be sustained much longer. It takes so much of Mr. Strange’s strength, and mine, to achieve it and I do not think Mr. Strange is sufficiently recovered from his ordeal in Italy to support it for any great length of time. I must leave you soon, Childermass --”

“Wait! Mr. Norrell --” Childermass drew a deep breath. “I promise you, sir. I will find a way to end this enchantment. Even if I must walk every road behind every mirror in the land, and find John Uskglass and fall upon my knees before him and beg -- I will find a way to bring you and Mr. Strange home.”

Norrell smiled. “I am sure of it. I believe in you, John.”

It was the first time Childermass could remember Norrell ever calling him by his Christian name. The sound of it, coming through the silent rain, seemed to pierce him like a sharpened blade. He did not know how the feeling might have transformed his countenance, but Norrell was staring at him with an expression in which embarrassment and pleasure were mingled together, a rose on each of his cheeks.

“Will you -- will you do one thing for me, John?” Norrell asked.

“Anything, sir.”

“Will you -- will you say my name? My given name?”

It took Childermass a moment to speak. “I am still your servant, Gilbert. I always will be your servant.”

“Dearest John,” Norrell said, and he tried to smile but his lips were quivering. “You are, and always have been, much more than that.”

For a time they simply stood, facing each other through the rain, memorizing the image of one another’s face. Then the sheet of water began to twist again and at the same moment, instinctively, they both reached for each other through the veil of illusion.

“John --”

“Gilbert --”

Childermass stuck his hand through the rain, towards the hand that Norrell had thrown out and, for just one moment, his fingertips made contact: not with cold water or colder stones, but with flesh, Norrell’s flesh. Norrell made a sound of surprise and his fingers curled around Childermass’s.

“John, I --”

“I know, Gilbert,” Childermass said, gripping him. “I know.”

And then the rain coiled itself, tighter and tighter, until it was no more than the circumference of a ribbon and Norrell’s image vanished in the middle of the spinning tendril of water. Smaller and smaller it grew until it disappeared entirely and Childermass stood alone in the corner of the Close, the toes of his boots wet with vanished rain, his eardrums throbbing with the unheard sound of magic.

“I’ve never failed you in the performance of my duties,” Childermass whispered to the damp stones and the shadows. “I don’t intend to start now.”

He laid his hand for a moment against the wet stones, then - clearing his throat, for the chilly evening air seemed to have caught in his chest a bit - Childermass turned his back on York Minster and resumed his walk toward Vinculus and the warm fireside of The Black King’s Arms.

***

As soon as the spell dissolved itself, Norrell found he no longer had the strength to remain standing. He collapsed into the chair behind his desk and sat, staring at his hands. His skin was damp and his fingers trembled.

After a few minutes the door to the library opened and Strange came back inside. He did not speak, but walked slowly over to where Norrell sat, shaking, and watched the older man closely.

Then he reached down and took one of Norrell’s hands in his own.

Norrell could not look into Strange’s face, so after many minutes of silence in which he tried to still the chattering of his teeth and calm the hurricane that seemed to be raging behind his eyes, leaking out saltwater stirred up by the storm, he addressed his words to Strange’s knees instead. “He -- he said that he shall take care of your wife.”

Strange nodded. “And I shall take care of you.”

Norrell looked up at last, not caring if Strange saw his tears. Strange offered him a smile.

“And so we will pass the time in contentment, sir. Until we are reunited again with -- with the ones we love.”

Norrell found he could not speak, so he simply squeezed Strange’s hand a little harder.


End file.
